Thinking is a serious problem: we like what we like

In my posts last year I mentioned three critical aspects that affect our thinking: our unconscious, our emotions, and the process known as selective perception. In the latter, we accept only information with which we already agree with or that we like. Any contrary information not only cannot get in, it has to be destroyed, often (metaphorically speaking) along with the person bringing the message.

When most of us read about issues that concern us we usually imagine that we are thinking when we make decisions about what we will respond to and what we will agree or disagree with. Regrettably, this view is largely false. In fact, what’s really going on is that we align incoming information with our preconceived notions and the emotions that support those, leading to  selective perception.

Consider a very contentious issue: the minimum wage. There are two groups of economists on opposite sides of this issue, one that says raising the minimum wage is helpful to the less economically fortunate, and the other saying that in fact such an increase harms the job possibilities of those very people, and both have Nobel-prize winners in support. Who is right?

There is no way to definitively answer the question because neither side can conclusively prove its position. Worse yet, even after raising or not raising the rate neither side can prove its position. The biggest problem with all such complex issues is that the models used by the economists are built on assumptions that are not always testable or verifiable, meaning that the economists themselves are working off of information that is not conclusive. They have chosen the data that fits with their view of the minimum wage issue and have essentially neglected that which does not confirm their view. They are not necessarily acting falsely, but because there is so much ambiguity in the data, which can often be interpreted in a variety of ways, they have to make choices. But at least partially unconsciously they accept and interpret the data in ways that bolster their position and undermine that of the opponents. As I have said in prior posts, it is the lack of understanding that unconscious processes are driving much of what we “think” that causes so much misunderstanding and hostile difference.

Most of us have no way of understanding the very complex models that underlie each side’s position on the minimum wage, but that does not stop us from having an often very-firmly held position on the issue, underlain by a huge emotional commitment. So what thinking is going on? Virtually none if we are talking about critical thinking. Essentially what happens is that we read the statements of the economists whose view we like, and we say that is the correct view. We haven’t the slightest idea of the how the models were developed or whether assumptions that underlie them are accurate. Thus, our ability to assess correctness borders on zero. We like what we like and that is the answer. Clearly, to think critically, to think objectively, we need far more information and expertise that would allow us to make a carefully reasoned judgment. Lacking that, which in the case of minimum wage includes most of us, we accept what we are told if we agree with it and assume unconsciously that that has something to do with correctness. Often, we then trash the person who disagrees with us. No thought and no thinking. The only possible, rational position is: I don’t know, which may be accompanied by, but I do like this one. At least this would be intellectually honest.

What I have said about the minimum wage is the same for nearly everything about which we have exaggerated and often vicious arguments. Those arguments are over nothing because we understand little about the issue’s complexity, meaning a terrible lack of clarity and an abundance of emotional messiness. Such arguments’ viciousness are in direct proportion to the emotional commitment the person has to a position. That emotion keeps us from any chance at a fair and objective discussion. But there is one thing that is very clear. My goal is, “I win, you lose.” Somehow I have to crush you, using emotion, misrepresentations, outright lies, diversions, anything. If your ideas have merit, my whole structure of “thinking” (read emoting) could be in error. That cannot and will not happen.